


Starting to Remember

by Waldo



Series: What Happens Tomorrow [3]
Category: Torchwood
Genre: Angst, Episode Related, Episode Tag, Episode: s02e04 Meat, Episode: s03e13 Last of the Time Lords, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Nightmares, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-03-01
Updated: 2008-03-01
Packaged: 2017-10-04 09:59:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waldo/pseuds/Waldo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ianto knew that the events at the abbatoir were more personal than Jack let on, but now that Jack's talking, Ianto's not sure he *does* want to know what happened to Jack on the Valiant.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Starting to Remember

**Author's Note:**

> Betas by the fabulous [](http://kyrdwyn.livejournal.com/profile)[**kyrdwyn**](http://kyrdwyn.livejournal.com/) and [](http://ladykoori.livejournal.com/profile)[**ladykoori**](http://ladykoori.livejournal.com/).

_How to begin? Do I shed a skin?  
Now that I am starting to remember  
It takes a while, but you find a way to open up the door  
Let demons walk, now that I am..._   


\- Duran Duran, "Starting to Remember"

 

It was late. Everyone else was gone and both Jack and Ianto had stopped pretending to work over an hour ago. Ianto was sitting at Gwen's computer poking through some internet sites that often yielded a tip or two on Weevil sightings or alien artifacts that ended up on someone's bookshelf or in their footlocker, but was mostly just over-caffeinated college kids looking for something strange. Jack was pacing from the kitchenette to his office to the hothouse and back again. Ianto kept a covert eye on him wondering what was causing the restlessness.

After a while Jack stood behind him and hooked his chin over Ianto's shoulder, his arms snaking around Ianto's waist.  "Anything interesting?"

Ianto punched off the monitor. "Just that little teenage boy who's convinced his sister is an alien bent on world domination. This week's angle is that she's using her mobile phone to call her home planet, but Pluto keeps reversing the charges. This is why his mum can't afford to buy him the football jersey he wants." Ianto shrugged.

"Someone should write to tell him that Pluto isn't a planet any more so that can't be it." Jack wished he could come up with something snappier, but he knew he couldn't even force the kind of levity into his voice that he wanted.

Ianto took Jack's hands in his and loosened them just enough so that he could turn the chair to face Jack. He caught Jack's eyes and held them. "Why don't I fix us both a drink and you can tell me what's been on your mind since we heard about that creature in the abbatoir?"

"Ianto-" Jack said sharply as he pulled back and looked away, automatically fighting down the bile that had been at the back of his throat all day.

Ianto stiffened and let Jack go. "Or I could just head out for the night. It's been a long day." He never knew when or how far to push Jack. He wanted Jack to know that he'd be there for him, but he was terrified that if he pushed too far that he'd wake up to find that Jack was gone again. And he wasn't yet at all confident that if Jack ever left again, that he would come back.

Jack caught his arm. "No, don't. Don't go. Please. I know I've been… difficult today, but…it's not your fault. You haven't done anything wrong." Jack pulled him in and hugged him. "I know it's late, but, do you want to go walk down by the bay or something?"

Ianto nodded then twisted his hand to take Jack's in his. "You've been acting claustrophobic since we got back from burning the abbatoir."

"'Abbatoir'" Jack mocked. "It was a slaughterhouse."

Ianto nodded. "Yes it was. My point was, you've been pacing since we got back." He raised an eyebrow, asking Jack to explain without outright asking.

Jack shivered. "Come walk with me for a while? When we get back I'll try and explain."

Ianto nodded and leaned in to kiss Jack softly. "I'll get our coats."

 

They walked in silence. Jack held Ianto's hand in the pocket of his greatcoat, occasionally squeezing tight as a memory over-ran him. He was grateful for both Ianto's presence and his silence. After a while they stopped and leaned on the rail, Ianto slid his hand free of Jack's pocket and wrapped it around Jack's waist as they both stared at the way the moonlight skipped over the ocean. Ianto leaned his head on Jack's shoulder as they stood, faces in the wind, sharing body heat.

When he heard Jack sniffle, Ianto looked up at Jack. He wiped away the single tear on Jack's face and kissed his cheek, but stayed silent. It was clearly what Jack wanted.

Jack sniffled again and put his arm around Ianto and hugged him tight. For more than an hour, they stood there, watching as the occasional bird broke the moonbeams, feeling the spray of the ocean when it the rocks with particular force. Every few minutes Ianto would dry Jack's cheeks with his thumb or a handkerchief, but neither of them spoke.

Ianto could feel when Jack stiffened his spine, when he took several deep breaths in a row, and heard him clear his throat. "Come back with me and I'll tell you what I can," Jack whispered, trying to sound sure that he was doing the right thing, but to Ianto he just sounded defeated.

Ianto wasn't sure he wanted to be privy to whatever it was that could break Jack Harkness.

 

When they got back, Ianto took their coats and hung them in Jack's office. Jack started pacing again, looking agitated and claustrophobic again; whatever benefit he'd gotten from the walk seemingly eradicated. "Do you want to go down-"

"No!" Jack bit out more sharply than he'd meant to. "No, let's just stay up here." He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. It sounded stupid and juvenile in his own head, but just couldn't imagine sleeping in his own bed if he were to try and explain life and death at the hands of the Master in that same room. He needed to keep things separate.

Ianto canted his head and studied Jack. He'd never seen Jack act skittish. Ianto had seen him stare down things like Weevils and face terrors like Abbadon. "Alright," he agreed coming out of Jack's office and sitting on the couch. He watched Jack for a while before realizing that Jack was waiting for him to lead this conversation. His lips twisted. That would be a lot easier if he had any idea what it was they were trying to talk about. "Come sit with me," Ianto tried, going for something neutral.

Jack was rubbing his wrist under his watch, eventually taking it off and shoving it in his pocket and running his hand over his wrist. He didn't move from where he stood near the watertower.

Ianto watched him curiously. "Jack? Is your arm okay? Come here and let me see." He didn't want to treat Jack like a child, but he wasn't sure what he was supposed to do or say.

Jack finally came over and flopped down next to Ianto. He held out his arm. "I'm fine. See?"

Ianto looked over the skin on Jack's wrist, gently tracing the veins with his fingers and not letting go of his hand even after he'd assured himself that there was no damage. "I see. So why were you rubbing at it?"

Jack squeezed his hand again. He closed his eyes and tipped his head back against the back of the sofa. "I had an iron manacle around it for almost a year. Sometimes… I know it's just my watch, but it startles me."

Ianto ran his fingers up and down Jack's wrist in gentle strokes. "Who did that to you, Jack?" he asked quietly.

"A truly fucked-up-insane monster."

Ianto watched as Jack worked to control his breathing. He wished he could get into Jack's mind, know how much to push and how much to just accept that Jack wouldn't or couldn't talk about.

"At first he was using me to get to the Doctor. I never knew what he wanted the Doctor to do… maybe nothing. He was just that fucked up. But he thought torturing me would get him… something. I don't know." His voice was whisper soft and he'd gone back to scratching at his wrist.

Ianto slid his hand between Jack's. He knew Jack couldn't actually do serious damage to himself with the rubbing and scratching, but it bothered him nonetheless. Something so significant had happened that even Jack was feeling phantom pain. When Jack didn't seem inclined to speak again, Ianto prompted him quietly. "You said 'at first'. What happened later?"

"I died slowly," Jack said simply. "The first two times he saw me die I was electrocuted and then shot with some kind of laser. I guess that was mildly entertaining, but later on he discovered that it was…" Jack stopped and pushed his hair out of his face and forced himself to take several deep breaths. "He decided it was entertaining to see how long he could keep me in pain before I eventually blacked out or died. He'd realized he couldn't keep me dead, so he started to show… how creative he could be. He liked to keep me on the edge – wishing I'd die, but hanging on for days. God, I remember the first time he ordered them to simply exsanguinate me." His hand came up to his neck and reflexively Ianto searched for a scar near Jack's jugular. Of course there was nothing.

Suddenly Jack sat up straight and fixed Ianto with such an intense stare that Ianto struggled to meet it. "There's no good way to die. None. But bleeding to death? I think that's the worst…" he stopped for a moment and swallowed against the memory. "It takes so long. You get so damn cold. Everything hurts, not just wherever you're cut. And you feel so alone."

Ianto pulled Jack's head down onto his shoulder and kissed his head. "You aren't alone, Jack." It was poor comfort, but all he could say at the moment.

Jack snuggled into Ianto like he'd been waiting for the comfort to be offered for so very long. "I know. I know, really. Thank you."

Ianto gave him a thin smile and began rubbing his hand up and down Jack's spine. He placed another soft kiss in his hair before asking, "Jack, what is it that's bothering you tonight? There's something in particular bothering you today, isn't there?" As soon as the question left his lips, Ianto realized that this would be the crux of the problem. Jack had been tortured and Jack had died before he left with his Doctor, but Ianto had the very strong suspicion that he'd never been tortured to death over and over and over the way he was starting to suspecting had happened. And something about that creature in the warehouse had all of it surfacing in ways Jack just couldn't ignore.

"I don't think there was anything he didn't do to me," Jack said suddenly calmer than Ianto figured he should be. "It… fascinated him that no matter what he did, I kept coming back. He'd carve me up and wait until I died and start all over. I still look for scars. I know there aren't any. After I come back… there's never a mark. But it always feels like there should be."

Ianto scowled into Jack's hair. He knew that around the office they tended to make glib comments about Jack's immortality and as often as not Jack was either the instigator of the joke or its perpetuation. Ianto realized that there'd be nothing funny about Jack's resilience any more. And that there'd be awkward moments when he either shot one of the other team members a look for their crass comments and he couldn't explain why he no longer joined in with remarks of his own. Somehow he couldn't bring himself to care that Owen would have all kinds of comments about him coming to Jack's defense over something that Jack had never seemed to need to be defended over before.

"He…" Jack stopped and Ianto looked down to see Jack's eyes screwed shut, and Ianto could feel Jack's breathing quicken under the hand on his back. "He…" Jack's hands were actually shaking. "Fuck, why am I telling you this? You don't want to know this." He tried to sit up, to move away, but Ianto held him tight.

For a brief, horrifying moment, Ianto realized that Jack was right. He didn't _want_ to know. He was sure that anything so bad that Jack couldn't make a joke and a quick, 'Look at me, I'm fine' comment would probably give him nightmares too. He understood Jack's need to protect him, but he also realized that anything that had Jack Harkness so undone, needed to be shared. It needed to be dealt with openly so that Jack could find some peace. After everything Ianto had been through – Lisa, the cannibals, thinking he'd lost Jack to Abaddon – Jack had been there insisting that he talk, that he not carry his own burdens, that he let someone in so that he could move on.

"Tell me, Jack," he whispered, pulling Jack's head back down to his shoulder.

"Ianto-" Jack protested, but Ianto put a gentle finger over his lips.

"Tell me. I want to help."

Jack went limp against Ianto's side and Ianto knew he felt that somehow he'd been defeated. That whatever sense of control he'd had had been stripped away by memories and circumstances of the day. Ianto had never wanted to do that to him, but he also knew that Jack would needed to give up some of that control if he was ever going to allow anyone to help.

Jack slid down to bury his face in his hands. "He skinned me, okay?" he finally bit out, trying to use anger to cover his absolute dread of something so physically harmless as a memory. "He cut bits of me off to see how much of my…" He stopped and swallowed and his voice was so hoarse when he began again that Ianto had to strain to hear him. "How much of my body I could live without and for how long."

Ianto's stomach flipped over and for a terrible moment he was sure that he was going to be sick. He had a hysterical moment where he wondered if that would be a good thing for Jack to see – that the thought of someone hurting him upset Ianto so much that it made him sick. He squeezed Jack tight against him. "Oh, Jack…" He had no words to make this better. He had to hope that his presence would be soothing enough.

"_He_ rarely touched me," Jack said, his voice more steady. "He had people to do the actual messy work. He had a surgeon. Someone who knew how to…" he shook his head against Ianto. "How to drag it out." Jack stiffened and wrapped his arms around his stomach.

Ianto gently stroked Jack's bare wrist. "You feeling sick?" he asked quietly.

"It'll pass. Or not… I don't know. I've felt like this all day," Jack admitted.

"Because those men were doing the same things to that creature. That's why you wanted so badly to save it," Ianto did the mental math aloud. "Because no one was there to save you."

Jack just sighed loudly.

Ianto was ashamed to be grateful that Jack had stopped describing what had been done to him. He wanted to help, but maybe, for once, Jack was right when he said that it was too much for anyone else to handle. "We did what we could, Jack. You know Owen only did what he did because he knew that being was in agony. He didn't want it to suffer and we didn't have a way to get it home even if it had lived. We certainly couldn't have kept it in the vaults."

"I know," Jack said, his breath still coming in short pants. He pulled away from Ianto and leaned over and hung his head, trying to still his stomach.

Ianto surreptitiously pulled the small trash bin next to his side of the couch around and set it next to Jack's feet.

Jack looked up and gave Ianto a wan smile of thanks.

Ianto noticed for the first time how long Jack's hair was getting. He brushed the fringe off Jack's forehead. "I'm glad you shared that with me; I know it wasn't easy."

Jack turned his head to look at Ianto, the faintest glimmer of his normal self returning to the bright blue eyes. "No you aren't," Jack said tensely. "You're as green as I feel."

Ianto smiled softly. "I won't say it doesn't make me sick to think that someone did that to you. But I will say that I know it took an inordinate amount of trust for you to tell me."

Jack leaned back on Ianto's arm. "Yeah, I guess."

"And I'm very honored by that." Ianto put his arm back around Jack's shoulders and they sat in silence for a few long minutes. Finally Ianto kissed Jack's temple. "I think there's still some mint tea upstairs. Why don't I put on a kettle and we can both try to get our stomachs under control."

Jack nodded. "And maybe I'll finally get the damn smell of burned meat out of my nose."

Ianto nodded. "You want to rest here for a few minutes while I get the water on?"

"I'll come up with you," Jack said turning to kiss Ianto's neck and wrap his arms around Ianto's waist.

Ianto realized that it'd be a while before Jack would feel comfortable being completely alone and squeezed him back. "Come on. It's almost half two. Lets have some tea and get some sleep. I reckon even you're getting a bit tired." Ianto stood and pulled Jack to his feet. Jack came up and straight into Ianto's space. Jack's arms tightened around Ianto but he didn't say anything.

Ianto knew what he meant anyway. He gently caressed Jack's wrist again. "I'm staying tonight," he whispered. "Of course I'm staying."

Jack sighed, "Thank you." He mentally crossed off one of the hardest things to tackle on that letter he'd written Ianto not long after he'd come home. That had been a bad night, but not nearly as bad as this one. And if Ianto could handle hearing about what had happened on the Valiant, there was a good chance he could accept the rest of the things that plagued Jack's mind. He hadn't intended to tackle the worst things first, but if this was the worst, there was hope that the rest wouldn't be so bad.

He tipped Ianto's head up and kissed him thoroughly. They both had a faintly sour taste in their mouths, but neither seemed to care. Jack had loved a lot of people, made love to so many more, but he'd never needed the love he was receiving that night in a more fierce and essential way.

"I meant what I said, Ianto," he whispered into Ianto's hair. "I came back for you."

Ianto just hugged him tight, and they both took and received comfort in equal measure.


End file.
